


Redress

by Davechicken



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: M/M, Morning after the night before
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-21
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:08:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21887203
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken
Summary: On bodies, clothes, and sharing.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 14
Kudos: 84





	Redress

**Author's Note:**

  * For [UlsPi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/UlsPi/gifts).



He could, of course, just snap and bend the world and wrap this body of his back in his accustomed clothes. (But were they? Were they his? This body, remade by the Antichrist himself. He couldn’t claim that he’d kept them pristine for decades, now.) He could swaddle away pale and vulnerable skin, conform (only just) to common sensibilities and be done with it.

But it seemed wrong. Seemed wrong to ignore the ritual physicality of it, now.

This body had been gone, and was born again. Then he’d left of his own volition, and seen that face move around another’s thoughts and moods. More sombre than he felt he normally looked - but did he? What did he look like, to everyone else? Not the false expressions in mirrors, but the glanced views of an unprepared, unschooled face? 

What did the layers of fabric and the unspoken communication in the choice of his shoes say to everyone else? Neat. Crisp. Bright.

Unchanging.

He hadn’t always been so static. Hadn’t always been locked into the same patterns and cuts. But the faster Crowley’s fashions changed, the harder he’d slammed on his own brakes. The more he’d huddled, turtle-like, into his shell.

Soft fabrics. Hard barriers.

His fingers slid the socks up his ankles, feeling the tendons as if it was the first time he’d been ever in this body, all over again. Familiar, but entirely _other_ , now. Like the ticking clock you could not unhear. Like the way you’d see a face in a paisley swirl on the wall, and it would _always be there_.

This body was alien, now. Or - no - _changed_. 

Different.

Everything was changed, even if it looked - to a casual observer - the same. He was ‘free’. Free from the constraints he’d felt, the eyes on him. He was free from the expectations. He was... he was his own self.

Pulled apart by Heaven, put together by what should have been Hell, but was something else. A child created to end everything, and a demon who absolutely refused to. They’d made him this, protected it from harm, and...

And then something utterly fabulous, which shouldn’t have been so wonderful, but had been, all the same. Fingers laced with his. Kisses over skin. Hisses in his ear. Bodies moving to find pleasure, but a pleasure that Aziraphale knew was merely a reflection of a deeper need, deeper love. Crowley had loved him without their consummation, and would have continued to love him. 

Aziraphale would, too. But it hadn’t hurt at all to tumble into his arms and lips. To put his hands on a body he’d been inside of, and watch the way his touches to familiar-but-not made the light inside crackle and call out. They’d ignored all the rules, and made up their own, and shared something that maybe humans knew, but angels didn’t. Couldn’t. Wouldn’t. 

He could feel, below the places where shirt touched shoulder, the memory of fingernails and the sting of sweat and the tense-release of their lovemaking. He tugged his bowtie tighter, and didn’t do it to hide any mark that might be there, but to press the ghost-lips more firmly to his skin. A bare echo of the real thing, but a reminder. 

This body was his, and Crowley’s, too. Just as his demon had given him the same. The shadows of their touches weren’t for others to witness, and he coiled the clothes around himself jealously. He didn’t want anyone else to pry into that, into the voice that bounced down his spine and reminded him of how Crowley would _yield_ and **demand** and _offer_ and **share**. Tight belt around his middle, an attempt to ground himself on the floorboards, and not on the bed. 

It was not that he didn’t want anyone to know about them. It was just that the details - the secret of their feelings - those were for others to only guess at, and never know.

Lanky limbs tugged a pillow in, behind him, as Crowley whined in his sleep. Missing him. Wanting him. Just... wanting to hold and be held. Naked and unashamed, he spread over the bed like a re-echoing memory, and Aziraphale brushed hair back from his face and kissed his shoulder.

“I’m not going anywhere, my dearest heart,” he whispered. “You can rest easy.”

Hearing, on some level, the serpent uncoiled and arched towards his warmth. Aziraphale pushed fingers through his russet locks, and hummed a soft lullaby to ease him back to sleep.

Only Crowley would see him dress, and undress. It was something for him alone.


End file.
